About Knowledge, Truth and Falsity

[ryan]

Is science really saying that "is true" is just something that usually comes after some statement X that our brains transcribed previously through repetition? So do our brains see X; and then "is true" just follows from always seeing "X is true" in the past?

So what does "it's true" or "it's false" even mean? Is "I don't know" have a different meaning than some other answer?

Is "a lie" simply an object next to some other object with no other meaning?

Or is there some deeper metaphysical connection in the mind?

 

[fast]

If the proposition expressed by a declarative sentence corresponds to a fact of the world, then the proposition expressed by the sentence is a true proposition. For instance, consider the sentence, "the cat is on the mat." Suppose the cat is on the mat. The proposition expressed by the sentence would therefore be true since there's a match between the proposition and the fact.

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A lie is the utterance of a falsehood with the intent to deceive.

 

[fast]

Truth is independent of knowledge, and knowledge implies truth. I may not know whether or not the cat is on the mat, but either the cat is on the mat or not. I may not know the truth of the matter, but there is a truth of the matter despite my knowledge or lack thereof.

 

[ryan]

... there's a match between the proposition and the fact.

I want to know more about what makes this match a match.

If you look at it objectively or from a really alien alien's perspective, there is just everything interacting with everything else locally. But somewhere in all of the chaos, there seems to be something different about the "link" that matches the sentence "The cat is on the mat." to the actual event. The alien just sees the physicalness of the situation. But we know the physicalness of the situation and something else. What is this?

 

[Juma]

Is science really saying that "is true" is just something that usually comes after some statement X that our brains transcribed previously through repetition? So do our brains see X; and then "is true" just follows from always seeing "X is true" in the past?

So what does "it's true" or "it's false" even mean? Is "I don't know" have a different meaning than some other answer?

Is "a lie" simply an object next to some other object with no other meaning?

Or is there some deeper metaphysical connection in the mind?

Meaning is created by inferring intention. The drawings in the sand means something if we believe us to see an intention with them: that some intelligent being ment to convey information.

That something "is true" has many different meanings. I assume that you refers to wether a specific proposition about reality describes that part of reality well or not.

Then "it is true" just means that the description is a good enough model of the fact and "it is false" means that it is not good enough. What is deemed "good enough" will vary due to the intentions of the speaker.

"I dont know" means that we dont have enough information to judge wether the model is good enough or not.

 

[ryan]

Is science really saying that "is true" is just something that usually comes after some statement X that our brains transcribed previously through repetition? So do our brains see X; and then "is true" just follows from always seeing "X is true" in the past?

So what does "it's true" or "it's false" even mean? Is "I don't know" have a different meaning than some other answer?

Is "a lie" simply an object next to some other object with no other meaning?

Or is there some deeper metaphysical connection in the mind?

Meaning is created by inferring intention. The drawings in the sand means something if we believe us to see an intention with them: that some intelligent being ment to convey information.

That something "is true" has many different meanings. I assume that you refers to wether a specific proposition about reality describes that part of reality well or not.

Here you have the verb "describes". What does it actually mean for some arbitrary part of reality to describe another arbitrary part of reality? What is this seemingly metaphysical link?

Objectively, there isn't anything but causes and effects. How does a certain cause and effect gain this extra significance?

 

[Juma]

Meaning is created by inferring intention. The drawings in the sand means something if we believe us to see an intention with them: that some intelligent being ment to convey information.

That something "is true" has many different meanings. I assume that you refers to wether a specific proposition about reality describes that part of reality well or not.

Here you have the verb "describes". What does it actually mean for some arbitrary part of reality to describe another arbitrary part of reality?

Describes = models = holds a bunch of information that can be asked questions and return answers (as in "what happens if I steps on it", "why did it do that?" Etc)

What is this seemingly metaphysical link?

Objectively, there isn't anything but causes and effects. How does a certain cause and effect gain this extra significance?

I have already answered that: the modelling of other agents (and your own) intention.

It is simple as that. When you write "cat" I, more or less automatically, calculates "why did he write "cat"? The result is a actuation of my concept of cat. (Which may not be exactly the same as yours).

Bottom line: meaning is not an object, it is an action, a process, a behavior.

 

[ryan]

Here you have the verb "describes". What does it actually mean for some arbitrary part of reality to describe another arbitrary part of reality?

Describes = models = holds a bunch of information that can be asked questions and return answers (as in "what happens if I steps on it", "why did it do that?" Etc)

Juma, I know what it is suppose to mean on the surface. But think about what the term "describes" is really about. It does not seem to be explainable with just matter. Objectively, "a subject describes an object" is just another object. But as you mention below, there is more to it.

What is this seemingly metaphysical link?

Objectively, there isn't anything but causes and effects. How does a certain cause and effect gain this extra significance?

I have already answered that: the modelling of other agents (and your own) intention.

Okay, this is one of those rare times where we agree on something. But what do you say to the physicalists that will ask how "intention" fits into the physical world. Scientifically "intention" is just another physical object with no other meaning. But to humans, it is about something else.

Sometimes I think a solution is that the mind is actually a small or large system of entangled particles in the brain. Its instantaneous multi-computational properties would explain how we could have choices and not hardwired predetermined choices. The randomness of the system would explain physically how we could have intentions. For example, the system might instantaneously see 5 possible outcomes by sampling 5 different modeled scenarios. Essentially, some of the brain could be a function of this significantly smaller system.

What do you think?

 

[Juma]

Describes = models = holds a bunch of information that can be asked questions and return answers (as in "what happens if I steps on it", "why did it do that?" Etc)

Juma, I know what it is suppose to mean on the surface. But think about what the term "describes" is really about. It does not seem to be explainable with just matter. Objectively, "a subject describes an object" is just another object. But as you mention below, there is more to it.

What is this seemingly metaphysical link?

Objectively, there isn't anything but causes and effects. How does a certain cause and effect gain this extra significance?

I have already answered that: the modelling of other agents (and your own) intention.

Okay, this is one of those rare times where we agree on something. But what do you say to the physicalists that will ask how "intention" fits into the physical world. Scientifically "intention" is just another physical object with no other meaning. But to humans, it is about something else.

Sometimes I think a solution is that the mind is actually a small or large system of entangled particles in the brain. Its instantaneous multi-computational properties would explain how we could have choices and not hardwired predetermined choices. The randomness of the system would explain physically how we could have intentions. For example, the system might instantaneously see 5 possible outcomes by sampling 5 different modeled scenarios. Essentially, some of the brain could be a function of this significantly smaller system.

What do you think?

Intension is a model to understand behavior. We have goals and tries to avheive them. These goals are selected by our beliefs, hormons etc. There are larger and smaller goals, it is those goals that we try to model by intentions.

That why we see intentions even in non-thinking things: ouch. that chair purpously put its leg in front of my toe...

So if i view the planets of the solar system as a goal driven agent that it is its intension to go round and round the sun.

 

[ryan]

Juma, I know what it is suppose to mean on the surface. But think about what the term "describes" is really about. It does not seem to be explainable with just matter. Objectively, "a subject describes an object" is just another object. But as you mention below, there is more to it.

What is this seemingly metaphysical link?

Objectively, there isn't anything but causes and effects. How does a certain cause and effect gain this extra significance?

I have already answered that: the modelling of other agents (and your own) intention.

Okay, this is one of those rare times where we agree on something. But what do you say to the physicalists that will ask how "intention" fits into the physical world. Scientifically "intention" is just another physical object with no other meaning. But to humans, it is about something else.

Sometimes I think a solution is that the mind is actually a small or large system of entangled particles in the brain. Its instantaneous multi-computational properties would explain how we could have choices and not hardwired predetermined choices. The randomness of the system would explain physically how we could have intentions. For example, the system might instantaneously see 5 possible outcomes by sampling 5 different modeled scenarios. Essentially, some of the brain could be a function of this significantly smaller system.

What do you think?

So if i view the planets of the solar system as a goal driven agent that it is its intension to go round and round the sun.

How do you know that the Sun is not constantly trying to go around the Earth? So many times our intentions do not happen.

 

[none]

Is science really saying that "is true" is just something that usually comes after some statement X that our brains transcribed previously through repetition?

I don't understand this question at all.

So do our brains see X; and then "is true" just follows from always seeing "X is true" in the past?

I am guessing here: Since it is empirical evidence in theory it could be repeated and in practicality repeating it would produce a similar outcome but not the same outcome exactly.

So what does "it's true" or "it's false" even mean?

In philosophical terms, I don't know because the question seems kind of vague to me.

 

[ryan]

I don't understand this question at all.

So do our brains see X; and then "is true" just follows from always seeing "X is true" in the past?

I am guessing here: Since it is empirical evidence in theory it could be repeated and in practicality repeating it would produce a similar outcome but not the same outcome exactly.

So what does "it's true" or "it's false" even mean?

In philosophical terms, I don't know because the question seems kind of vague to me.

Does "truth" lose all meaning when seen scientifically or objectively. For example, if "2 + 2 = 4 is true" is just a process in the brain, then "is true" is just an object that usually comes after the object 2 + 2 = 4. In rare cases, "is false" might come after it, not because someone was wrong, but because that is just what was materially predetermined - just the way the process goes. Are there no intentions or will that transcends matter? If not, then there is no meaning to "truth" and probably nothing else would have meaning either.

 

[none]

Does "truth" lose all meaning when seen scientifically or objectively.

Depends on what definition you are using for truth, scientifically, and objectively.
I could go out on a limb and give some weird response but I am unsure of what you mean.

For example, if "2 + 2 = 4 is true" is just a process in the brain, then "is true" is just an object that usually comes after the object 2 + 2 = 4.

In my opinion 2+2=4 can be true in the right context.

 

[ryan]

Depends on what definition you are using for truth, scientifically, and objectively.
I could go out on a limb and give some weird response but I am unsure of what you mean.

For example, if "2 + 2 = 4 is true" is just a process in the brain, then "is true" is just an object that usually comes after the object 2 + 2 = 4.

In my opinion 2+2=4 can be true in the right context.

Objectively, 2 + 2 = 4 is really just [object #1] [object #2] [object #1] [object #3] ... There is no sense of "connection" or holistic meaning between them. They are just objects floating through space.

 

[fast]

... there's a match between the proposition and the fact.

I want to know more about what makes this match a match.

If you look at it objectively or from a really alien alien's perspective, there is just everything interacting with everything else locally. But somewhere in all of the chaos, there seems to be something different about the "link" that matches the sentence "The cat is on the mat." to the actual event. The alien just sees the physicalness of the situation. But we know the physicalness of the situation and something else. What is this?

There are two ways to speak of truth. One is language dependent, and the other is language independent. When people say the truth is out there, they're speaking of the latter-the facts of the world. If we look out unto the world an observe something, there is the sense in which we are discovering truths, and when we speak of the truth we see yet speak of it inaccurately, then truthful as we might want to be, the statements made about that which we see are not entirely true--false even.

There are a variety of ways we can accurately speak of something. Saying that a feline is on the mat is just as true as saying a cat is on the mat if there is a cat on the mat, for all cats are felines.

If an aliens perceives something differently than we do, then that which is there is still there independent of any of our perceptions. If an alien speaks of which they see (and does so accurately), then that which they speak is true. There can be a multitude of true statements about a single thing.

 

[Juma]

How do you know that the Sun is not constantly trying to go around the Earth? So many times our intentions do not happen.

Your remark is very weird. The solar system, seen just as large moving masses (abstracting away everything that doesnt have importance for their, movement) is a rather simple mechanical system. There is no such hidden states: the solar system do what it does. As does a falling stone. That is what makes it a good example.

A human brain on the other side is a very complex system capable of sustaining ver complex processes which enables it to model other brains behaviour.

So your remark is weird: there is no wsy the solar system should want to do somehhing else than it does: it doesnt have a brain for it!

(If you dont include those tiny creeps on the earth in the model, they are complex enough to blow a planet into smithereens)

 

[ryan]

I want to know more about what makes this match a match.

If you look at it objectively or from a really alien alien's perspective, there is just everything interacting with everything else locally. But somewhere in all of the chaos, there seems to be something different about the "link" that matches the sentence "The cat is on the mat." to the actual event. The alien just sees the physicalness of the situation. But we know the physicalness of the situation and something else. What is this?

There are two ways to speak of truth. One is language dependent, and the other is language independent. When people say the truth is out there, they're speaking of the latter-the facts of the world. If we look out unto the world an observe something, there is the sense in which we are discovering truths, and when we speak of the truth we see yet speak of it inaccurately, then truthful as we might want to be, the statements made about that which we see are not entirely true--false even.

There are a variety of ways we can accurately speak of something. Saying that a feline is on the mat is just as true as saying a cat is on the mat if there is a cat on the mat, for all cats are felines.

If an aliens perceives something differently than we do, then that which is there is still there independent of any of our perceptions. If an alien speaks of which they see (and does so accurately), then that which they speak is true. There can be a multitude of true statements about a single thing.

I am talking about meaning and what the connection is between two otherwise randomly placed objects in the universe, the reference and a referent.

 

[ryan]

How do you know that the Sun is not constantly trying to go around the Earth? So many times our intentions do not happen.

Your remark is very weird. The solar system, seen just as large moving masses (abstracting away everything that doesnt have importance for their, movement) is a rather simple mechanical system. There is no such hidden states: the solar system do what it does. As does a falling stone. That is what makes it a good example.

A human brain on the other side is a very complex system capable of sustaining ver complex processes which enables it to model other brains behaviour.

So your remark is weird: there is no wsy the solar system should want to do somehhing else than it does: it doesnt have a brain for it!

(If you dont include those tiny creeps on the earth in the model, they are complex enough to blow a planet into smithereens)

I was exploring what you said.

 

[Juma]

Your remark is very weird. The solar system, seen just as large moving masses (abstracting away everything that doesnt have importance for their, movement) is a rather simple mechanical system. There is no such hidden states: the solar system do what it does. As does a falling stone. That is what makes it a good example.

A human brain on the other side is a very complex system capable of sustaining ver complex processes which enables it to model other brains behaviour.

So your remark is weird: there is no wsy the solar system should want to do somehhing else than it does: it doesnt have a brain for it!

(If you dont include those tiny creeps on the earth in the model, they are complex enough to blow a planet into smithereens)

I was exploring what you said.

No, you did not. Exploring what I said would consiste of using my concepts and models and see where they led you. You just used your own magical concept of intention on the solar system.

 

[ryan]

I was exploring what you said.

No, you did not. Exploring what I said would consiste of using my concepts and models and see where they led you. You just used your own magical concept of intention on the solar system.

When I think of intention, I think of a mental will. It is pretty much next to impossible to know for sure if intentions exist or not, never mind what agents intend and how they do this.